Learn to hold thy tongue; five words cost Zacharias forty weeks of silence.
– Thomas Fuller
Gossip | Discretion | The Tongue
Your words can permanently influence a life.
– Jerry Falwell
Discretion
We must have a spirit of power towards the enemy, a spirit of love towards men, and a spirit of self-control towards ourselves.
– Watchman Nee
Discretion | Power | Self-control
Free will is not the liberty to do whatever one likes, but the power of doing whatever one sees ought to be done, even in the very face of otherwise overwhelming impulse. There lies freedom, indeed.
– George Macdonald
Discretion | Freedom | Liberty
Discretion of speech is more than eloquence, and to speak agreeably to him with whom we deal is more than to speak in good words, or in good order. God has placed no limits to the exercise of the intellect he has given us, on this side of the grave.
– Francis Bacon
Kindness | Discretion
With foxes we must play the fox.
– Thomas Fuller
Discretion
If thou would’st be borne with, then bear with others.
– Thomas Fuller
Friendship | Discretion
If thou art a master, be sometimes blind, if a servant, sometimes deaf.
– Thomas Fuller
Discretion
An institution has to decide, and it’s not just an option, it’s a responsibility, how much diversity can be tolerated.
– Albert Mohler
Discretion
Haste and rashness are storms and tempests, breaking and wrecking business; but nimbleness is a full fair wind blowing it with speed to the haven.
– Thomas Fuller
Apathy | Discretion | Business
Soft words are hard arguments.
– Thomas Fuller
Discretion
Choose a wife rather by your ear than your eye.
– Thomas Fuller
Discretion
Prescribe no positive laws to thy will; for thou mayest be forced tomorrow to drink the same water thou despisest today.
– Thomas Fuller
Hypocrisy | Discretion
If you run after two hares, you will catch neither.
– Thomas Fuller
Contentment | Discretion
He that will not sail till all dangers are over must never put to sea.
– Thomas Fuller
Discouragement | Discretion
Temperance is simply a disposition of the mind which binds the passions.
– Thomas Aquinas
Discretion | Passion
Contentment consists not in adding more fuel, but in taking away some fire.
– Thomas Fuller
Contentment | Discretion
Hear the other side.
– Augustine
Discretion
Bad excuses are worse than none.
– Thomas Fuller
Discretion
A small demerit extinguishes a long service.
– Thomas Fuller
Service | Discretion
When men comfort themselves with philosophy, ’tis not because they have got two or three sentences, but because they have digested those sentences, and made them their own: philosophy is nothing but discretion.
– John Selden
Philosophy | Discretion | Men
Generosity, wrong placed, becometh a vice; a princely mind will undo a private family.
– Thomas Fuller
Giving | Discretion
Trust thyself only, and another shall not betray thee.
– Thomas Fuller
Discretion | Trust
Reading is good, hearing is good, conversation and meditation are good; but then, they are only good at times and occasions, in a certain degree, and must be used and governed with such caution as we eat and drink and refresh ourselves, or they will bring forth in us the fruits of intemperance.
– William Law
Discretion | Meditation
Tis skill, not strength, that governs a ship.
– Thomas Fuller
Discretion
We must be careful with our lives, for Christ’s sake, because it would seem that they are the only lives we are going to have in this puzzling and perilous world, and so they are very precious and what we do with them matters enormously.
– Frederick Buechner
Discretion | Life
It is good to make a jest, but not to make a trade of jesting.
– Thomas Fuller
Character | Discretion
Thou mayst as well expect to grow stronger by always eating as wiser by always reading. Too much overcharges nature, and turns more into disease than nourishment. ‘Tis thought and digestion which make books serviceable, and give health and vigor to the mind.
– Thomas Fuller
Health | Discretion
Judge of thine improvement, not by what thou speakest or writest, but by the firmness of thy mind, and the government of thy passions and affections.
– Thomas Fuller
Virtue | Discretion | Judging
While we are zealous for good works, let us be careful not to put them in the place of Christ’s righteousness, and not to advance anything which may betray others into so dreadful a delusion.
– Matthew Henry
Service | Discretion | Zeal
Pray a little more, work a little harder, save, wait, be patient and, most of all, live within our means. That’s the American way. It’s not spending ourselves into prosperity or taxing ourselves into prosperity.
– Mike Huckabee
Discretion | America | Work
One may miss the mark by aiming too high, as too low.
– Thomas Fuller
Discretion
Care and diligence bring luck.
– Thomas Fuller
Achievement | Discretion | Diligence
Better fare hard with good men than feast with bad.
– Thomas Fuller
Discretion
You can’t be too careful what you tell a child because you never know what he’ll take hold of and spend the rest of his life remembering you by.
– Frederick Buechner
Discretion | Children
In conversation use some, but not too much ceremony; it teaches others to be courteous, too. Demeanors are commonly paid back in their own coin.
– Thomas Fuller
Virtue | Discretion
Make no vows to perform this or that; it shows no great strength, and makes thee ride behind thyself.
– Thomas Fuller
Character | Discretion
Do not in an instant what an age cannot recompense.
– Thomas Fuller
Discretion
He that resolves to deal with none but honest men, must leave off dealing.
– Thomas Fuller
Honesty | Discretion | Men
Tact is the art of making a point without making an enemy.
– Isaac Newton
Discretion | Enemies
Many have been the wise speeches of fools, though not so many as the foolish speeches of wise men.
– Thomas Fuller
Wisdom | Discretion | Foolishness
Rashness is the faithful but unhappy parent of misfortune.
– Thomas Fuller
Discretion
Make not thy friends too cheap to thee, nor thyself to thy friend.
– Thomas Fuller
Friendship | Discretion
Better give a shilling than lend and lose half a crown.
– Thomas Fuller
Finances | Discretion
It is thy duty oftentimes to do what thou wouldst not; thy duty, too, to leave undone that thou wouldst do.
– Thomas a Kempis
Discretion
When a Christian does not repel the thoughts which originate with evil spirits he affords them a base for working.
– Watchman Nee
Discretion
When thou makest presents, let them be of such things as will last long; to the end they may be in some sort immortal, and may frequently refresh the memory of the receiver.
– Thomas Fuller
Giving | Discretion
Your words can make others love, or they can make them hate.
– Jerry Falwell
Discretion
Take heed of jesting; many have been ruined by it. It is hard to jest, and not sometimes jeer too, which often sinks deeper than we intended or expected.
– Thomas Fuller
Character | Discretion
Venture not to the utmost bounds of even lawful pleasures; the limits of good and evil join.
– Thomas Fuller
ContentmentDiscretion
Free advice is sometimes the most costly kind.
– Woodrow Kroll
Discretion
Curiosity is a kernel of the forbidden fruit which still sticketh in the throat of a natural man, sometimes to the danger of his choking.
– Thomas Fuller
Discretion
He that’s cheated twice by the same man is an accomplice with the cheater.
– Thomas Fuller
Honesty | Discretion
Better a little fire to warm us than a great one to burn us.
– Thomas Fuller
Discretion
Depart from discretion when it interferes with duty.
– Hannah More
Service | Discretion
Scoff not at the natural defects of any which are not in their power to amend. It is cruel to beat a cripple with his own crutches!
– Thomas Fuller
Mercy | Discretion
The believer’s experience is consequently a rather complex matter. It is imperative that we determine for ourselves whether we have been delivered from the base and the ignoble.
– Watchman Nee
Discretion
Tis better to suffer wrong than do it.
– Thomas Fuller
Suffering | Discretion
‘Tis better that thou be rather something sparing, than very liberal, to even a good servant; for as he grows full, he inclines either to be idle, or to leave thee: and if he should at any time murmur, thou mayest govern him by a seasonable reward.
– Thomas Fuller
Examples | Discretion | Rewards
Be careful to make a good improvement of precious time.
– David Brainerd
Stewardship | Discretion | Time
If the master takes no account of his servants, they will make small account of him, and care not what they spend, who are never brought to an audit.
– Thomas Fuller
Discretion